Sofia Richie, Jenna Bush Hager, Megan Thee Stallion and many other women are going for the bob — the enduring blunt haircut.

(Video: Katty Huertas/The Washington Post)

Bouncy, bold and literally cutting-edge, bob hairstyles have long served as a statement look. So when Jenna Bush Hager had her hair cut above her shoulders live on the “Today” show last month, she said the blunt haircut “inspired the country.”

“It’s so cool,” Leslie Bibb of “The White Lotus” exclaimed, clapping and squealing as Chris McMillan, the Beverly Hills celebrity stylist, clipped Hager’s hair. The “Today” show referred to Bibb’s style as the “blunt bob,” although McMillan earlier named it the “c---y little bob” when he cut Bibb’s hair, using a word that’s considered either an obscenity or an endearing descriptor depending on the context — and somehow became a provocative way to explain the off-putting attitudes of women who wear the haircut.

As the women chatted about Hager’s new look the next day, Bibb called bobs “vulnerable.” Bibb and Hager agreed that the look goes against Southern beauty standards. “It’s really scary to just say, ‘Here’s my truth,’” Bibb said.

Bobs demand attention. Think of the trademark bob Anna Wintour, one of the most powerful figures in fashion, has been sporting since she was a teenager. Or the courtroom bobs that meant business when Megan Thee Stallion and Meghann “Thee Reporter” Cuniff wore them during the 2022 Tory Lanez shooting trial. Or the bob wearers who toss their hair around to Nicki Minaj’s feature on a B.o.B song: “What’s your name? B.o.B? / So, they calling you Bob? / Stop playing … you know that I’m known for the bob.” When fashion It girls like Sofia Richie and Ayo Edebiri sport a bob, it becomes a headline-worthy affair. Even bad bobs elicit strong reactions, as was the case when Barbie Ferreira’s character downplayed the distinctiveness of her bob in “Euphoria.”

Ever since bobs took off as a hairstyle around the early 20th century, they have grown to become a beloved cultural mainstay and a female empowerment symbol, taking on new shapes to keep up with ever-changing hair trends, stylists say. A well-styled bob’s versatility and utility has allowed a more-than-a-century-old hairstyle to look youthful and striking with each iteration.

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Bobs gained traction with middle-class women from the 1920s to the 1950s, running parallel with the flapper era, the women’s suffrage movement, world wars and women entering the workforce, said Rachael Gibson, a London-based hair historian. Throughout it all, bobs were the answer for women in search of shorter, easier-to-maintain haircuts that suited their more active lifestyles.

“Basically through the entirety of history in Western society, women had long hair until we get to the start of the 1900s, so it’s … really shocking when women start cutting their hair short. People are not happy about it,” Gibson said. “Long hair is so intrinsically linked to femininity and respectability and all these … ideas that people have about what it is to be a woman. When people cut their hair short, it’s like. ‘What are you doing?’”

In the ’50s and ’60s, hairstyling legend Vidal Sassoon used clean, geometric lines to take the bob to new heights (and shapes). Ashley Javier, a New York-based celebrity hairstylist, learned how to create a helmety version of the cut as an aspiring hairdresser, blow drying with a Denman brush to give the bob a tiny curve and using a mirror to check underneath the bob to ensure it could sway in all the right ways without getting tousled.

“Vidal Sassoon was able to transition an entire society who had been doing their hair at a salon under the dryer with rollers,” Javier said. “He was able to cut these bobs that there was no way to mess it up.”

McMillan’s brainchild “The Rachel” was wildly successful in the 1990s. The style was a layered, shoulder-length bob and shag hybrid named after Jennifer Aniston’s character on “Friends.”

Sassoon’s influence also inspired stylists like Javier and McMillan to put their own modern flair on the haircut.

Instead of mushroom-shaped bobs that are too dense in the back, or the graduated bob associated with Karens, Javier emphasizes that each woman can get her hair cut to her bob ceiling — the shortest bob that looks flattering on her — and wear it out until her hair reaches her bob floor — the longest bob she can rock before it stops feeling fashionable. For habitual bob wearers, once their hair hits rock bob bottom, they know it’s time to return to the salon and continue the cycle.

“When you have a bob, it’s fun,” Javier said. “I used to call the bob the VIP ropes to my face.”

Kalissa Persaud, a 23-year-old actor and content creator in Queens, said she feels most like herself with short hair. Persaud, in search of a big life change after graduating from college, had her butt-length hair cut into a bob — and has been hooked with her Dora the Explorer-type hair ever since. She has been exploring what she calls “choreBOBgraphy” by playing with her bob’s delayed swaying movement. And her cropped hair helps her stay cool in sweltering summertime heat.

“Bobs have had a real comeback,” she said. ” … They’re just a fun little accessory. They’re really easy to dance with; it’s a fun party trick sometimes. And I think people really found the comedy in having a bob.”

It’s also been TikTok “For You page” fodder. Persaud filmed a bob reveal video, transitioning from mid-length to short hair with the close of her bathroom cabinet door, and a video to Minaj’s B.o.B verse. She’s seen clips where women tug their long hair before a transition that reveals they’ve cut it into a bob. It has made her friends and social media commenters consider whether they should get a big chop, too, she said.

Hairstylists love to rave about how chic and youthful bobs can be. They frame facial features well and “feel cool, modern, and fresh,” Los Angeles stylist Laura Polko said. Celeb hairdresser Justine Marjan says bobs are fashion-forward because they’re short enough to not disrupt an outfit’s silhouette.

“It takes confidence to cut and wear your hair short, and that is what this haircut portrays,” said New York City master hair colorist Tiffanie Richards.

But bob hopefuls also risk humiliation if their bobs end up in bad shape. The hair can be too slanted, have a mushroom shape where the hair sticks out more in the back than in the front, or lack the little extra length in the front needed to tuck the hair behind the ear, Javier said.

Bad bobs live on in infamy, viewed as “the villain cut,” he added. There’s the stereotypical Karen cut, with its colors, layers and stiffness, which mirrors the high-maintenance, low-pleasure personality Karen is known for. Blah bowl cuts — particularly pageboy bobs such as the one worn by the hot-tempered “Shrek” antagonist Lord Farquaad — are usually telltale signs that a hairstyle literally took an unflattering turn.

But there’s also an element of fun in a blunt bob that doesn’t quite look right. Remember Starburst’s dancing berries-and-cream Little Lad? His antiquated bob swung like a pendulum in the strange 2007 ad as he sang, “Berries and cream, berries and cream / I’m a little lad who loves berries and cream” to bystanders.

“I hate her,” a “Euphoria” watcher remarked in a now-famous comment from 2023 about Ferreira’s character, Kat. The fictional teenager was called into the principal’s office and questioned about a video the principal presumed she was in. “‘Is it because i’m fat mr hayes’ no it’s because you the only one with that f--- a-- bob,” the watcher replied.

The latest bob people love to hate is Bibb’s blunt, blond bob for her role as the Austin transplant Kate on the third season of “The White Lotus.” Bibb’s haircut for the show was made famous in a meme where Kate squinted her eyes and gave a cheery grin when asked whom she voted for.

McMillan, the stylist behind Bibb’s playful bob, hasn’t come across the type of women who would ask for the style unironically: “To be perfectly honest, I don’t do well with the ‘See You Next Tuesdays,’” McMillan said, once more making reference to the style’s risqué nickname. “They don’t last in my chair for some weird reason.”

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